The principles that underlie official bilingualism are viewed broadly with the objective of making sense of the interplay between citizenship in the Canadian polity and its embodiment in federal (and ...
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The principles that underlie official bilingualism are viewed broadly with the objective of making sense of the interplay between citizenship in the Canadian polity and its embodiment in federal (and where relevant, provincial) language policy. Section 1 of the chapter gives an historical overview of events that have relevance to the development of official bilingualism construed as a civic commitment. Section 2 discusses three strands of citizenship that are involved in justifications (and criticisms) of language rights for French‐ and English‐speaking Canadians. Section 3 examines the degree to which some of these justifications can reflect moral ties between citizens and Section 4 looks at the current state of these ties.Less

Citizenship and Official Bilingualism in Canada

Pierre A. Coulombe

Published in print: 2000-03-16

The principles that underlie official bilingualism are viewed broadly with the objective of making sense of the interplay between citizenship in the Canadian polity and its embodiment in federal (and where relevant, provincial) language policy. Section 1 of the chapter gives an historical overview of events that have relevance to the development of official bilingualism construed as a civic commitment. Section 2 discusses three strands of citizenship that are involved in justifications (and criticisms) of language rights for French‐ and English‐speaking Canadians. Section 3 examines the degree to which some of these justifications can reflect moral ties between citizens and Section 4 looks at the current state of these ties.

Twenty chapters from two often-dissociated areas of Latin studies, classical and medieval Latin, examine continuities and developments in the language of Latin prose from its emergence to the twelfth ...
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Twenty chapters from two often-dissociated areas of Latin studies, classical and medieval Latin, examine continuities and developments in the language of Latin prose from its emergence to the twelfth century. Language is not understood in a narrowly philological or linguistic sense, but as encompassing the literary exploitation of linguistic effects and the influence of formal rhetoric on prose. Key themes explored throughout this book are the use of poetic diction in prose, archaism, sentence structure, and bilingualism. Chapters cover a comprehensive range of material including studies of individual works, groups of authors such as the Republican historians, prose genres such as the ancient novel or medieval biography, and linguistic topics such as the use of connectives in archaic Latin or prose rhythm in medieval Latin.Less

Aspects of the Language of Latin Prose

Published in print: 2005-11-24

Twenty chapters from two often-dissociated areas of Latin studies, classical and medieval Latin, examine continuities and developments in the language of Latin prose from its emergence to the twelfth century. Language is not understood in a narrowly philological or linguistic sense, but as encompassing the literary exploitation of linguistic effects and the influence of formal rhetoric on prose. Key themes explored throughout this book are the use of poetic diction in prose, archaism, sentence structure, and bilingualism. Chapters cover a comprehensive range of material including studies of individual works, groups of authors such as the Republican historians, prose genres such as the ancient novel or medieval biography, and linguistic topics such as the use of connectives in archaic Latin or prose rhythm in medieval Latin.

Latin is only one among many languages that have established themselves, in written form, by translating from others. The negative impact that humanism as promoted by Petrarch made on what is called ...
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Latin is only one among many languages that have established themselves, in written form, by translating from others. The negative impact that humanism as promoted by Petrarch made on what is called the ‘inclusiveness’ of medieval Latin is shown. The relation between bilingualism and translation is obviously intricate. The separate source of the anecdote emerges quite clearly in the language. The chapter also shows the three factors in the story of Latin: (a) native developments in the language, (b) Hellenisms that infiltrated into it, and (c) outright translationese, idioms remaining recognizably foreign. It is suggested that, as the development of Latin in all its forms is understood from antiquity down to the Renaissance, it could be useful to pay more attention to the role of translations from Greek; not as a category apart, but as a continuing process, constantly provoking or instilling redefinition of what is possible as written Latin, or indeed as Kunstprosa.Less

Translator’s Latin

A. C. Dionisotti

Published in print: 2005-11-24

Latin is only one among many languages that have established themselves, in written form, by translating from others. The negative impact that humanism as promoted by Petrarch made on what is called the ‘inclusiveness’ of medieval Latin is shown. The relation between bilingualism and translation is obviously intricate. The separate source of the anecdote emerges quite clearly in the language. The chapter also shows the three factors in the story of Latin: (a) native developments in the language, (b) Hellenisms that infiltrated into it, and (c) outright translationese, idioms remaining recognizably foreign. It is suggested that, as the development of Latin in all its forms is understood from antiquity down to the Renaissance, it could be useful to pay more attention to the role of translations from Greek; not as a category apart, but as a continuing process, constantly provoking or instilling redefinition of what is possible as written Latin, or indeed as Kunstprosa.

Code‐centric accounts of bilingualism obscure the processes whereby bilingual utterances acquire social significance by viewing them simply as admixtures of pre‐existing grammatical codes. This ...
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Code‐centric accounts of bilingualism obscure the processes whereby bilingual utterances acquire social significance by viewing them simply as admixtures of pre‐existing grammatical codes. This chapter proposes an alternative account: (1) Bilingual speakers produce speech tokens of varying degrees of fidelity to grammatical types (in matrix or source language) and, conversely, of varying degrees of type‐hybridity (blending category types across languages); and (2) speakers tend reflexively to re‐analyze degrees of fractional fit (of form tokens to types) as register contrasts among “social types” (types of person speaking, of activity or conduct performed through speech). Bilingual interaction thereby imposes a social‐characterological logic of register evaluation upon a logic of grammatical variation, producing contrastive models of person and activity type, some among which remain relevant only to the current interaction, while others become widely known (to bilinguals, or to monolinguals in one or the other language community) through forms of institutional dissemination.Less

What Do Bilinguals Do? : A Commentary

Asif Agha

Published in print: 2009-01-01

Code‐centric accounts of bilingualism obscure the processes whereby bilingual utterances acquire social significance by viewing them simply as admixtures of pre‐existing grammatical codes. This chapter proposes an alternative account: (1) Bilingual speakers produce speech tokens of varying degrees of fidelity to grammatical types (in matrix or source language) and, conversely, of varying degrees of type‐hybridity (blending category types across languages); and (2) speakers tend reflexively to re‐analyze degrees of fractional fit (of form tokens to types) as register contrasts among “social types” (types of person speaking, of activity or conduct performed through speech). Bilingual interaction thereby imposes a social‐characterological logic of register evaluation upon a logic of grammatical variation, producing contrastive models of person and activity type, some among which remain relevant only to the current interaction, while others become widely known (to bilinguals, or to monolinguals in one or the other language community) through forms of institutional dissemination.

This chapter is an examination of the personal side of language maintenance and language shift in the United States, as told by Asian‐Americans from immigrant families. Pertinent selections were ...
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This chapter is an examination of the personal side of language maintenance and language shift in the United States, as told by Asian‐Americans from immigrant families. Pertinent selections were taken for over 250 “language autobiographies” submitted over several years in a course at the University of California at Berkeley. In these autobiographies, the students reveal their struggles with learning English and the concomitant decline of their heritage tongue. They describe from a personal point of view the processes of language attrition and the embarrassments, intergenerational isolation and ultimate regrets coming from their own illiteracy, incomplete learning and attrition of their family's native language. The conclusion points out the waste of heritage languages which, if supported better in the school system, could be important resources for the United States.Less

Trading Tongues : Loss of Heritage Languages in the United States

Leanne Hinton

Published in print: 2009-01-01

This chapter is an examination of the personal side of language maintenance and language shift in the United States, as told by Asian‐Americans from immigrant families. Pertinent selections were taken for over 250 “language autobiographies” submitted over several years in a course at the University of California at Berkeley. In these autobiographies, the students reveal their struggles with learning English and the concomitant decline of their heritage tongue. They describe from a personal point of view the processes of language attrition and the embarrassments, intergenerational isolation and ultimate regrets coming from their own illiteracy, incomplete learning and attrition of their family's native language. The conclusion points out the waste of heritage languages which, if supported better in the school system, could be important resources for the United States.

This chapter presents an in-depth linguistic evaluation of a corpus of messages posted in several bilingual newsgroups in Catalonia (Spain). The social context is a situation of bilingualism and ...
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This chapter presents an in-depth linguistic evaluation of a corpus of messages posted in several bilingual newsgroups in Catalonia (Spain). The social context is a situation of bilingualism and language contact where Spanish seems to be progressively overtaking Catalan as the language of daily use. The decline of Catalan might be prevented by integrating online machine translation (MT) into newsgroups, so that Catalan speakers do not feel the need or pressure to shift to using Spanish. Therefore, the main goal of this chapter is to ascertain the linguistic characteristics of the email register, in order to assess the implications for the implementation of online machine translation environments. The chapter reports to what extent different types of linguistic mistakes or deviations from the norm threaten the feasibility of online automatic translation, and offers some suggestions how to overcome the limitations of MT systems in processing “noisy” CMC input.Less

Published in print: 2007-05-01

This chapter presents an in-depth linguistic evaluation of a corpus of messages posted in several bilingual newsgroups in Catalonia (Spain). The social context is a situation of bilingualism and language contact where Spanish seems to be progressively overtaking Catalan as the language of daily use. The decline of Catalan might be prevented by integrating online machine translation (MT) into newsgroups, so that Catalan speakers do not feel the need or pressure to shift to using Spanish. Therefore, the main goal of this chapter is to ascertain the linguistic characteristics of the email register, in order to assess the implications for the implementation of online machine translation environments. The chapter reports to what extent different types of linguistic mistakes or deviations from the norm threaten the feasibility of online automatic translation, and offers some suggestions how to overcome the limitations of MT systems in processing “noisy” CMC input.

There has been a good deal of concern around the world about the disproportionate role of English on the Internet and thus a possible displacement of other languages. Yet little prior research has ...
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There has been a good deal of concern around the world about the disproportionate role of English on the Internet and thus a possible displacement of other languages. Yet little prior research has investigated the relationship between use of English and other languages online. This chapter combines linguistic analysis, a survey, and interviews to examine English and Arabic language use in online communication by a group of young professionals in Egypt. The study indicates that among this group, English is used predominantly in World Wide Web browsing and formal email communication, but that a romanized version of Egyptian Arabic is used extensively in informal email messages and online chats. This online use of English and Arabic is analyzed in relation to broader social trends of language, technology, globalization, and identity.Less

Language Choice Online : Globalization and Identity in Egypt

Mark WarschauerGhada R. El SaidAyman Zohry

Published in print: 2007-05-01

There has been a good deal of concern around the world about the disproportionate role of English on the Internet and thus a possible displacement of other languages. Yet little prior research has investigated the relationship between use of English and other languages online. This chapter combines linguistic analysis, a survey, and interviews to examine English and Arabic language use in online communication by a group of young professionals in Egypt. The study indicates that among this group, English is used predominantly in World Wide Web browsing and formal email communication, but that a romanized version of Egyptian Arabic is used extensively in informal email messages and online chats. This online use of English and Arabic is analyzed in relation to broader social trends of language, technology, globalization, and identity.

Migration groups and diasporic communities are important contemporary sites for bi- and multilingual discourse on the Internet, which this chapter explores, taking discussion forums of German-based ...
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Migration groups and diasporic communities are important contemporary sites for bi- and multilingual discourse on the Internet, which this chapter explores, taking discussion forums of German-based migrant groups as a case in point. German and home languages (such as Greek, Persian, and Indian languages) are both used on these forums, albeit in proportions depending on the participants, topics, and interaction contexts. Quantitative language choice analysis of a popular Persian discussion forum suggests that the assumed relationship between home-language preference and home-culture topics holds true on a general level, but is challenged by fine-grained analysis of language choice within single threads. Sequential analysis of code-switching on Persian and Greek discussion forums suggests that typical patterns of discourse-functional code-switching are common on these forums. Methodologically, this chapter outlines a unified approach to the study of multilingual computer-mediated discourse, suggesting how to complement qualitative code-switching with quantitative language choice analysis.Less

Jannis Androutsopoulos

Published in print: 2007-05-01

Migration groups and diasporic communities are important contemporary sites for bi- and multilingual discourse on the Internet, which this chapter explores, taking discussion forums of German-based migrant groups as a case in point. German and home languages (such as Greek, Persian, and Indian languages) are both used on these forums, albeit in proportions depending on the participants, topics, and interaction contexts. Quantitative language choice analysis of a popular Persian discussion forum suggests that the assumed relationship between home-language preference and home-culture topics holds true on a general level, but is challenged by fine-grained analysis of language choice within single threads. Sequential analysis of code-switching on Persian and Greek discussion forums suggests that typical patterns of discourse-functional code-switching are common on these forums. Methodologically, this chapter outlines a unified approach to the study of multilingual computer-mediated discourse, suggesting how to complement qualitative code-switching with quantitative language choice analysis.

This chapter presents a bilingual version of dual coding theory. It reviews the implications of the theory for some current issues in the psychology of bilingualism, including semantic memory, ...
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This chapter presents a bilingual version of dual coding theory. It reviews the implications of the theory for some current issues in the psychology of bilingualism, including semantic memory, episodic memory, second language learning. The theory leads to a strong emphasis on the role of situational contexts and imagery in second language learning. In particular, the theory suggests that language-learning strategies based on the systematic use of referent objects, pictures, activities, and mental imagery would be especially effective in promoting learning.Less

Bilingual Cognitive Representation

Allan Paivio

Published in print: 1990-09-13

This chapter presents a bilingual version of dual coding theory. It reviews the implications of the theory for some current issues in the psychology of bilingualism, including semantic memory, episodic memory, second language learning. The theory leads to a strong emphasis on the role of situational contexts and imagery in second language learning. In particular, the theory suggests that language-learning strategies based on the systematic use of referent objects, pictures, activities, and mental imagery would be especially effective in promoting learning.

Research in code-switching, undertaken against the backdrop of very negative attitudes towards the concurrent use of two or more languages within the same conversation, has traditionally been geared ...
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Research in code-switching, undertaken against the backdrop of very negative attitudes towards the concurrent use of two or more languages within the same conversation, has traditionally been geared towards rehabilitating this form of language use. From being seen as a random phenomenon reflecting the user’s lack of competence, code-switching is currently seen as sign of an advanced level of competence in the languages involved and as serving different interactional functions. However, as a result of its success, the research tradition now faces an entirely new challenge: Where to from here? How can research in code-switching continue to be relevant and interesting now it has largely achieved its original purpose?
This books seeks to answer this programmatic question. The author argues that, in order to overcome this challenge, the notion of bilingualism (multilingualism) itself must be redefined. Bilingualism must be seen as consisting of multiple interactional practices. Accordingly, research in bilingualism and in code-switching in particular must aim to describe each of those practices in its own right. In other word, the aim should be an empirically based understanding of the various interactional practices involving the use of two or more languages. In the book, this new research direction is illustrated by means of three case studies: language choice and speech representation in bilingual interaction, language choice and conversational repair in bilingual interaction and language choice and appositive structures in written texts in Rwanda.Less

Bilingualism as Interactional Practices

Joseph Gafaranga

Published in print: 2016-12-01

Research in code-switching, undertaken against the backdrop of very negative attitudes towards the concurrent use of two or more languages within the same conversation, has traditionally been geared towards rehabilitating this form of language use. From being seen as a random phenomenon reflecting the user’s lack of competence, code-switching is currently seen as sign of an advanced level of competence in the languages involved and as serving different interactional functions. However, as a result of its success, the research tradition now faces an entirely new challenge: Where to from here? How can research in code-switching continue to be relevant and interesting now it has largely achieved its original purpose?
This books seeks to answer this programmatic question. The author argues that, in order to overcome this challenge, the notion of bilingualism (multilingualism) itself must be redefined. Bilingualism must be seen as consisting of multiple interactional practices. Accordingly, research in bilingualism and in code-switching in particular must aim to describe each of those practices in its own right. In other word, the aim should be an empirically based understanding of the various interactional practices involving the use of two or more languages. In the book, this new research direction is illustrated by means of three case studies: language choice and speech representation in bilingual interaction, language choice and conversational repair in bilingual interaction and language choice and appositive structures in written texts in Rwanda.